Welcome to the Learning Innovation Unit website, Dublin City University

Learning Innovation Unit

Learning Technology workshops 2010/11

Using Technology for Assessment and Feedback:

Finding and Creating E-learning Resources

Online Communication and Groupwork

Technology for Learning: An Introduction

Date(s): 17 January 2011, 10am – 1pm, 8 February 2011, 10am – 1pm and on request

Aims of this workshop:
The first part of this workshop will provide participants with an overview of how technology may be used to support teaching and learning. Participants will explore the opportunities offered by technologies such as:

  • Virtual Learning Environments, E-portfolios and Synchronous Classrooms
  • Podcasts, Video and Screencasts 
  • Games/Simulations and Virtual Worlds

Participants will also consider possible challenges associated with implementing learning technologies. The second part of the workshop will provide an introduction to the Moodle Virtual Learning Environment.

At the end of this workshop participants will be able to:

  • recognize how learning technologies can support teaching and learning 
  • identify challenges associated with introducing learning technologies
  • identify opportunities to incorporate learning technology into their teaching
  • create basic activities and resources in Moodle 

E-Assessment: Tools and Techniques

Date(s):  21 January 2011, 10am – 12pm, 22 February 2011, 10am – 12pm and on request

Prerequisites: Attendance at a “Getting started with Moodle” or "Technology for Learning: workshop" or some experience using Moodle.

Aims of this workshop:
This workshop will introduce participants to how technology may be used to support assessment.  Participants will be introduced to a range of e-assessment tool including:

  • Moodle Quizzes
  • Moodle Assignments
  • Turnitin
  • The Mahara e-portfolio
  • Moodle Wikis
  • Moodle Journals
  • Moodle Workshop (a peer assessment activity)
  • Moodle's Gradebook.

At the end of this workshop participants will be able to:

  •   recognize the opportunities and challenges associated with e-assessment
  •   design an e-assessment relevant to their context

Moodle Quizzes for Formative and Summative Assessment 

Date(s):  21 January 2011, 2:00pm – 3:30pm and on request

Prerequisites: Attendance at a “Getting started with Moodle” or "Technology for Learning: workshop" or some experience using Moodle.

Aims of this workshop:
This workshop will provide participants with an overview of  Moodle’s quiz activity. This module allows you to set up many different question types, including multiple choice, short answer, calculated, matching and true or false. Participants will explore how Moodle quizzes may be used for formative and summative assessment and feedback.

At the end of this workshop participants will be able to:

  • recognize how well designed online quizzes can support student learning and assessment
  • design quiz questions for summative and formative assessment
  • set up a Moodle quiz
  • create quiz questions in Moodle
  • add feedback to quiz questions in Moodle

Peer Assessment with Moodle's 'Workshop' Activity

Date(s): 22 March 2011, 10am – 12pm and on request 

Prerequisites: Attendance at a “Getting started with Moodle” or "Technology for Learning: workshop" or some experience using Moodle.

Aims of this workshop:
Peer assessment is the assessment of students by students. Peer assessment can help students develop critical thinking skills, and can be a practical way to increase the volume of feedback provided to students in larger classes. This workshop will provide an overview of the workshop module, Moodle’s peer assessment tool. The workshop modules provides a structured mechanism for designing and implementing peer assessment activities.

At the end of this workshop participants will be able to:

  • recognize how online peer assessment can support student learning
  • design a peer assessment activity
  • set up and manage a peer assessment activity via Moodle’s workshop module.

Using Turnitin to Support Learning

Date(s): 8 March 2011, 10am – 12pm and on request

Introduction to the Mahara e-portfolio system

Date(s): 16 December 2010, 10am – 12noon

Aims of this workshop:

Paper-based portfolios have been used in education for many years. In recent times the electronic portfolio or ePortfolio has emerged as a preferred option, allowing portfolio owners to take advantage of digital technologies, often supported by specific ePortfolio software. This workshop is being offered in order to raise awareness of the educational potential of ePortfolios and guide further investigation of the subject. This workshop is useful for academic staff interested in finding out more about ePortfolios, answering questions such as:

  • what is an e-portfolio?
  • how can an e-portfolio be used in different contexts?
  • what are the benefits and/or challenges involved?
  • what e-portfolio software is available in DCU?
  • how do I use the software?

At the end of this workshop participants will be able to:

  • define an e-portfolio
  • distinguish between a number of uses of an e-portfolio
  •  identify possible contents of an e-portfolio
  • discuss the potential benefits and challenges of integrating e-portfolios in teaching in a higher level environment
  • summarise the potential benefits of integrating e-portfolios as an assessment methodology
  • demonstrate a basic understanding of how to use Mahara e-portfolio software

Online Groupwork 

Date(s): 18 January 2011, 2pm – 4pm, 5 April 2011, 10am – 12pm and on request 

Prerequisites: Attendance at a “Getting started with Moodle” or "Technology for Learning: workshop" or some experience using Moodle.

Aims of this workshop:
This workshop will introduce participants to Moodle’s group management and metacourse capabilities. Moodle groups allow you to assign participants to group(s) within a course, facilitating group work and group administration. Moodle metacourses can populate many courses from one enrolment or one course from many enrolments.

At the end of this workshop participants will be able to:

  • recognize how learning technologies can support student groupwork
  • reconize the challenges associated with introduce online groupwork
  • design a Moodle-based groupwork activitiy.
  • distinguish between various Moodle group types
  • create groups in Moodle
  • assign course participants to groups
  • apply groups at the course and activity level.

Designing 'E-tivities'

Date(s): 19 April 2011, 10am – 12pm and on request 

Prerequisites: Attendance at a “Getting started with Moodle” or "Technology for Learning: workshop" or some experience using Moodle.

Aims of this workshop:
This workshop will provide an overview of how “e-activities” (online activities conducted via a discussion forum  may be used to support student learning).

At the end of this workshop participants will be able to:

  • design a forum-based “e-activity”
  • set up a new discussion forum
  • post a new message to a discussion forum
  • reply to a message in a discussion forum
  • manage and moderate forum messages

Finding and Using Open Educational Resources (Including an Introduction to the National Digital Learning Resource (NDLR) Service)

Date(s): 2 December 2010, 10am – 12noon,  19 January 2011 10am – 12noon and on request

Aims of this workshop:
The first part of this workshop will provide participants with an overview of open educational resources (OER) and how they may be used to support teaching and learning. The OER Movement means that anyone, anywhere may view and utilise digital resources under Creatice Commons Licence permissions. This reveals new possibilities for individuals and subject discipline networks to utilise the impact of digitised materials offered freely and openly to collectively raise the bar for learning design and use and reuse for teaching, learning and research.
The latter part of this session will outline some of the ways that NDLR is supporting a vision where Higher Education sector staff are supported and promoted in the collaboration, discovery, development and sharing of open digital content and associate teaching practices through use of innovative approaches and social networking tools.

At the end of this workshop participants will be able to:

  • source relevant OERs for their teaching and learning
  • recognize how OER can support teaching and learning
  • identify challenges associated with using, reusing, sharing and developing OER
  • identify opportunities to avail of support in the use of OER and thus improve the quality of teaching resources and enhancing teaching practice around their use
  • identify opportunities for getting support for collaborative development and sharing of resources across the education sector in Ireland and internationally, embracing partnerships with research and industry.

Creating Teaching and Learning Resources using Articulate Studio

Date(s): 15 December 2010, 10am – 12noon

Aims of this workshop:
Articulate Studio 09 is a user-friendly, powerful and flexible suite of tools which you can use to create engaging multimedia content. It integrates with MS PowerPoint and allows you to incorporate voice, video, Flash interactions and versatile quizzes into visually appealing packages to be delivered online, within VLEs (such as Blackboard or Moodle) or on CD-ROMs.

Participants will be introduced to: Articulate Presenter, Articulate Quizmaker, Articulate Engage and Articulate Video Encoder. An overview of the features in each of these tools will be covered along with examples of use. Participants will have time to explore each of the tools themselves with guided activities throughout the workshop.

At the end of this workshop participants will be able to:

  • create an Articulate file, add some content and publish to a flash-based e-learning resource
  • use a selection of features from the Articulate Studio suite including quizzes and interactions
  • understand  the capabilities of each Articulate tool
  • customise the look of an e-learning resource created in Articulate

Creating Teaching and Learning Resources using Camtasia

Date(s): 20 January 2011, 10am – 12pm and on request

Aims of this workshop:
Camtasia is a screen capture software program. Screen capture videos can be recorded with or without voice narration,and can be annotated after recording in order to incorporate navigation and quizzes. This workshop will introduce participants to the basic features of Camtasia.

At the end of this workshop participants will be able to:

  • recognize how Camtasia can support student learning 
  • record a narrated screen capture via Camtasia
  • edit a Camtasia video
  • add interactivity to a Camtasia recording
  • add subtitles to a Camtasia recording
  • produce a Camtasia video for web delivery

Podcasting for Learning

Date(s):  19 January 2011, 2:30pm – 4:30pm and on request

Aims of this workshop:
This workshop will provide participants with an introduction to how podcasting can support teaching and learning, and will introduce participants to the equipment and software necessary to create podcasts.

At the end of this workshop participants will be able to:

  • recognize how podcasts can be used to support teaching and learning
  • record a podcast using Audacity
  • export a podcast as an MP3 file
  • edit a podcast using Audacity.

Getting Started with the Wimba Collaboration Suite

Date(s): 18 January 2011, 10am – 12pm

Aims of this workshop:

A number of tools from the Wimba collaboration suite are available for staff to trial with during current academic year. This workshop will untroduce participants to  3 tools that can support provision of online and blended learning opportunities:

At the end of this workshop participants will be able to:

  • recognize how the Wimba collaboration suite can be used to support provision of online and blended learning opportunities
  • set up and moderaderate activities using Wimba Classroom, Wimba Pronto and Wimba Voice